10 May 2012

SEC Charges Anti-Gay Former Detroit Mayor in Pension Scheme

More problems for Detroit's anti-gay former Mayor Kwame M. Kilpatrick, who recently was released from prison after serving 14 months for obstruction of justice after his efforts to conceal a sex scandal. The Securities and Exchange Commission has accused Kilpatrick and a longtime friend with accepting lavish gifts, and private plane travel in an influence-peddling scheme involving pension funds, reports The Detroit Free Press.

The agency accused Kilpatrick and Jeffrey Beasley, both [trustees of the Detroit Police and Fire Fund], of accepting $125,000 worth of gifts—including private jet travel, golf outings, massages and concert tickets—from an investment adviser to the city's pension funds in exchange for preferential treatment. The adviser, MayfieldGentry Realty Advisers, had recommended the pension funds invest $117 million in a real estate investment, records state. The deal went through, but the travel and other perks to Kilpatrick and Beasley were kept secret.

The SEC now wants Kilpatrick and Beasley—both already facing separate criminal charges in federal court—to give back the dollar value of their alleged ill-gotten gains and pay an unspecified amount in civil fines. Charges by the SEC are not criminal and do not carry the possibility of prison time.

The investment advisers also gave "$50,000 in donations to the former mayor's charity, the Kilpatrick Civic Fund. The firm chartered private flights to Bermuda, Las Vegas and Florida for Kilpatrick, according to federal court records," adds The Detroit News.

During his scandal-plagued administration, Kilpatrick infamously campaigned for a same-sex marriage ban in Michigan, saying that he didn't "support equal rights for gays because marriage should be a sacred institution between 'a man and a woman.' "

The anti-gay mayor was later outed as a serial adulterer. Kilpatrick and his former chief of staff faced multiple felonies after tens of thousands of text messages surfaced, including many sexually explicit ones, that revealed they were having an affair and attempting to payoff witnesses with city funds. This was Kilpatrick's second publicized extramarital affair.

Kilpatrick's legal problems are only just beginning. Kilpatrick is facing a 38-count federal indictment "that accuses the former mayor and his circle of rigging contracts, collecting millions of dollars in bribes and defrauding taxpayers." The trial is expected to begin in September.